


Delirious

by Sauou



Category: Banana Bus Squad
Genre: Coping, Depression, Gen, POV First Person, References to Depression
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-04-30
Updated: 2016-04-30
Packaged: 2018-06-05 12:54:06
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings, No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,925
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/6705229
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Sauou/pseuds/Sauou
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>The wound is small, and unnoticeable at first glance. But it bears heavy weight in your heart, and becomes to you, something impossible to forget.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Delirious

There is an echo in the stairwell, down the corridor not often walked, and it sounds like bad ideas.

Poor decisions.

He walks the path slowly, young and scared.

He should not have come, but he is here all the same.

This is regret in its purest form. This is malcontent sitting in the doorway, staring him down.

This is his father gesturing to him with just one finger, whispering “Jonathan, come here.”

Come into the darkness. Come with me down. Down into the basement where things linger.

Things dwell.

Where your mother lays, bruised. Bleeding. At the bottom of the steps where she fell, twisted up inside herself.

Watching with wide eyes. Black eyes. One hand on her cheek. Holding the pain in.

Come. Come here. Come home.

You know what is coming.

You saw it all along the way, knew the path it would take.

Trace the air with your eyes as the fist strikes your cheek. As you fall.

And bleed. A line drawn through you. Down your soul. Down your cheek.

The blood obscuring your vision.

One eye swelling up as you see your mother rise, one hand on the steps. Her body stiff with tension and pain. Something more than words burning through her as she shouts.

Screams.

Rises. Climbing back to the surface. Fights her way to the top.

One step at a time.

One foot at a time. Crawling her way along. One hand on the wall. Focused and clear in a way you have never seen since.

Your father waits.

.

The wound is small, and unnoticeable at first glance. But it bears heavy weight in your heart, and becomes to you, something impossible to forget.

The room at the end of the hallway is much larger now, much quieter now without the second person occupying it.

Without your father looming down at you through it.

The world is strange and unfamiliar without him. You’re not sure of anything anymore. Not certain of what to trust.

He used to read you bedtime stories. Went to all of your baseball games. Cheered for you.

(Yelled at you. Belittled you in front of the fridge, your report card balled up in between his fists as he ranted and raved. As your mother stepped in, arguing for you. Over you.)

At breakfast he always made your favorite, scrambled eggs and french toast. Ruffled your hair as he walked through the kitchen. Smiled at you.

(Stared through you with cold eyes. Glared at you and muttered obscene things under his heavy intoxicated breath that you pretended not to hear.)

In some ways, it was easier with him here. You knew what to do then. You knew what you were.

You’re not sure of anything anymore.

.

The new house is far too small and all your sister does is complain about having to share a bathroom with you and all you want to do is go back home but home isn’t home anymore and if you were asked to describe it you wouldn’t be able to find the words.

You develop a nervous habit of rubbing at the same spot on your cheek, just under the eye where the faintest line can be seen if someone looks hard enough but no one ever has. You get angry at the wrong times at the wrong people and don’t even know where to begin to apologize.

You’re not sure how to start.

You’re sorry for so many things. So much you can’t tell, can’t confess to but yet desperately want to.

You blame them. You blame yourself.

You sit in the last row on the bus. Against the window, lost. You avoid eyes. They begin to avoid yours.

You get in fights, screaming. Letting loose all your rage in the wrong places. No concern for who or where or why.

You throw things.

You scream.

Your mother sits with you as the principal talks and talks and you glare at the wall, arms crossed and tense with a hate that burns deep inside you. A fire shimmering just beneath your skin.

Rage fills you. Slowly drowns you in it.

.

  
Winter comes, and the days grow colder.

Your fingers go numb waiting at the bus stop, and you stick your hands in your pockets, warming them.

Trying to thaw.

Cold burrows under your skin. Beneath your words.

You’ve pushed everyone away. There’s no one left who will meet your gaze when you look up, eyes heavy with lost sleep and worried thoughts.

Painful hope. Lost..

The words fail you. Have always failed. You don’t bother trying to even it out anymore.

You sit at the back of the bus, passing people who turn away as you walk by. Pretend you don’t exist. It’s easier that way.

Easier to just ignore them back. Lay your head against the window and close your eyes.

Shut down. Lay your soul to sleep and bury the pain.

Easier to be alone.

.

The world passes you by. Moves on without you.

Your mother laughs and goes out with nice men instead of staying home and making dinner. Worrying over you and moping over things she can’t change.

Your sister smiles all the time, and dates this weird kid who wears cheap sunglasses and acts like he’s cool.

You lock yourself in your room and refuse to change.

You don’t know what you’re fighting for anymore. But there is a hunger beneath your skin, a yearning for something you can’t name and it tears you up inside.

You feel abandoned.

You stay up all night playing video games, just to have something to do, a goal to reach for, and you can hear laughter in the kitchen.

It’s your sister and her boyfriend, giggling like they’re small children and he obviously makes her happy she hasn’t sounded like that in awhile, but you want nothing to do with either of them. So you turn the TV up until it’s blasting through the room, the walls are vibrating with the sounds of your game and you can hear nothing else.

You loose yourself.

It’s easier this way, forgetting. Not caring.

The controller sticks to your hands and hours pass. Days even where all you can see all you can hear are the flashing lights and cheap graphics of bad design.

Poorly made levels.

A fire sparks in your fingertips as you lose again and again and all of a sudden you have something to fight for.

It takes you by surprise, this determination.

You don’t know what to do with it.

The TV flashes long through the day and into the night. By yourself you conquer galaxies, whole virtual worlds and fight wars no one else has ever seen. Been down to.

You feel a sordid sort of contentment rising inside you.

You feel disgusted by your own emotions. You have no right to be free.

But, sometimes it’s easier not to care.

Sometimes it’s easier to plug in your headphones and lean your head against the window at the back of the bus.

Watch the world go by.

Close your eyes and dream.

Let go.

Loose yourself in little games and big ones. Play until you start to see the patterns.

The rhythms are universal.

It’s a dance and you move hesitantly through it, uncertain steps.

.

You begin to notice color in the world.

There was always color, it never left you, but somehow you forgot what it felt like to look at the sky and feel warm.

Joy.

Laughter bubbling up inside of you, rising deep from somewhere so far down that you wonder if there was always light there and you just never noticed it.

Your steps are lighter, your feet move quicker.

The walk to the back of the bus is easier.

You don’t even notice the people you pass along the way, it’s not important anymore what they think of you.

You tap your toes along to the beat, the rhythm of the music as houses pass you by, as the school looms ever and ever closer.

You don’t care anymore.

.

It’s an early Saturday morning and your sister is supposed to be home from work in a few more hours but you’re already up and you’re in the kitchen making a sandwich when the car pulls in and you’d know that engine anywhere.

It’s that guy who follows her around all the time and acts like he’s got something to prove, like he’s not quite sure of himself, or at least not yet.

He pulls into the driveway and the gravel hits the side of the house and it’s a soft warning. And you know you could go back to hiding in your room like you’ve always done but you’re hungry right now and you really want this sandwich you’re making so you stay.

You pull out the lettuce as he comes in, and the door hits him in the back.

He’s stopped right in it. He’s actually never seen you before, you finally realize.

The thought makes you grin.

This sudden humor feels strange, but you roll with it. It can’t hurt anything, can it? To be happy for awhile?

Luke looks you in the eyes and asks, “How’s it going?”

It’s such a polite company question, something anyone would say to anyone, stranger to stranger. But it means so much for reasons you can’t unbury that you just laugh.

Soft giggles at first, tiny chuckles that tickle your ribcage until it’s all barreling out all at once and then you’re standing in your own kitchen laughing with everything you’ve got at something that was never funny to begin with.

And he laughs with you.

You’re infectious, he tells you hours later, sitting beside you on the couch, still giggling at random times over all the things you say and you don’t care.

Really, and truly, you don’t care anymore.

By the time your sister gets home you two have bonded over every little thing.

You like horror movies and he likes monster flicks, but you both can agree on which was the best in both situations.

He’s played many of the same games you have, and plenty you haven’t gotten a chance to yet, and you invite him into your room.

Sitting beside him shoulder to shoulder on the floor because there’s no place else to go, finally getting to use the second controller that was collecting dust in the corner and it feels good.

You laugh. And he laughs with you.

.

Eventually he and your sister break up. You can hear her commiserating with your mother in the kitchen, crying and blaming. See the tubs of ice cream vanish with her behind her bedroom door.

After a few days, your mother won’t have anymore, and knocks on her door until she answers.

Until she rises from her darkest places (like you once had to do), and goes out.

Spends time in town with her best friends. Laughs and has fun and doesn’t come home until late.

And a deep sort of fear fills you up from inside and you’re not even sure what it is you’re so worried about until two weeks have past and you’re so restless with unease that you’re already up and running to the door before you recognize which car that is in the driveway.

Luke meets you halfway there, laughing as you hug him tightly like there was a chance he was never coming back, and asks quietly, “Is she still mad?”

“Yeah,” you whisper, “but she’s getting better.”

 


End file.
